FRIDAY, AUGUST 21, 2015
THE BAKER COUNTY PRESS — 5
Local
Sam Black goes to nationals 18-year-old
in shooting competition dies in crash
Photo courtesy of OSP.
Alcohol is thought to have been a factor in this
crash, which took one life on Sunday.
Submitted Photo.
This was the team representing Oregon at the 2015 National 4-H Shooting Sports Invitational, June 21-
26, 2015, Grand Island, Nebraska. From Left to Right: Vern Johnson, Shotgun Coach, Clackamas Co.,
Don Mowers, Rifle Coach, Yamhill Co., Mike Knutz, Oregon Representative, Yamhill Co., Porter Johnson,
Rifle, Benton Co., Jacob Johnson, Shotgun, Clackamas Co., Wyatt Hoy, Shotgun, Jackson Co., Sam Black,
Shotgun, Baker Co., Jarrett Coleman, Rifle, Yamhill Co.
• 4H CLUB HAS
ARCHERY, FIREARMS
TALENT TO SPARE
BY GINA K. SWARTZ
Gina@TheBakerCountyPress.com
The Baker County Fair
may be over, but for the
kids involved in the Patri-
ots 4H Club from Baker
County, the shooting club
is a year-round alliance.
Club leaders Toni My-
ers, Don Tholen and Jack
Myers coach The Patriots
in the disciplines of shot-
gun, rifle, and archer .
The Patriots have five
who shoot shotgun, five
shooting rifle and 13 who
compete in archery.
This year for the Fair,
rifle and shotgun were
completed a few weeks
beforehand, and the club
shot archery during fair.
Hay bales were placed
across the street for them
to shoot at.
Sam Black placed over-
all intermediate champion
at fair in shotgun.
The way the Patriots
compete is by meeting
monthly for tournaments
with the results mailed in.
Then the top six in the
county go to a State com-
petition in Albany, lasting
four days, where champi-
ons can then qualify to go
to the Nationals held in
Grand Island, Nebraska the
following year in June.
The State competitors’
scores must be at least 85%
to qualify.
Each state sets their own
qualifying standards. For
example, Texas will only
bring Senior shooters but
Oregon did not want to be
underrepresented at Na-
tionals, so standards were
different.
Oregon has gone to Na-
tionals for only three years.
This June was the first
year for shotgun, and local
shooter Sam Black repre-
sented Baker County.
The Oregon team con-
sisted of five youths from
all over Oregon: Jacob
Johnson, Shotgun, Clacka-
mas Co., Wyatt Hoy,
Shotgun, Jackson Co., Sam
Black, Shotgun, Baker
Co., Jarrett Coleman,
Rifle, Yamhill Co. Porter
Johnson, Rifle, Benton
Co. Coaches were Vern
Johnson, Shotgun Coach,
Clackamas Co. and Don
Mowers, Rifle Coach.
The coordinator of the
team was Mike Knutz from
McMinnville.
“Mike was great he
coordinated all the kids
from Oregon making sure
they all got their T-shirts,
made sure we all stayed at
the same hotel, coordinated
some dinners all together.
Made sure everyone got
to their events at the park
okay. He did a great job,”
said Whitney Black, Sam’s
mom.
According to Whitney,
who attended Nationals
this past June 21-26, “It’s
definitely a higher level of
competition than a lot of
stuff through 4H.”
She added, “Shooting
100/100 clays generally
will not even guarantee
first place, it will get you
a shoot off for first place.
The competition was just
unreal.”
Both Sam and Whitney
said that some of the teams
in the competition were
very large, like Texas and
Missouri.
Teams were divided up
and Sam had three team-
mates whom he didn’t
know beforehand.
Sam said, “You get to
meet a lot of new people
from all over, not just from
Oregon.”
The kids were given pins
to trade as an icebreaker to
help open lines of commu-
nication, and get the kids
to talking to each other.
Each state brought its
own pin—some making
their own. South Dakota
had their pin made from a
bullet. There were several
very cleaver pins.
Overall, 36 states were
represented at the 20-year-
old competition.
Before heading to
nationals, Sam did a lot of
practicing. He was not able
to practice with teammates
due to location, but Dan
Mitchell from Richland
who was on the Navy
skeet team and at one time
owned his own shooting
park teamed up to practice
with Sam even lending him
some equipment to use
when he was not able to
get together.
Sam travelled a lot to
practice for the events he
was participating in, skeet,
trap and 5 stand.
”People were so
helpful,” said Sam who
competed in those three
shotgun events. “The first
day you would shoot 100
practice rounds then you
do your event and follow
up shooting another 100
practice rounds for the
next day. So throughout
the week, I shot for three
events and I shot 100
rounds per event and an-
other 300 for practice. So
all total, I shot about 600
rounds in three days.”
Whitney said with a
smile, “He got a sore
shoulder.”
In the end, Sam said,
“For sporting clays and
skeet I placed in the lower
half but in trap I placed in
the upper 50%, higher in
the ranking, so I did pretty
good.”
Sam feels shooting
sports are growing, in
the last four years of his
attending just the State
competitions the number
of participants has gotten
higher every year.
He said, “It is a really
good program because it
teaches safety, gets you
comfortable around guns.
It is really good to be safe
with guns because then
you can keep other people
safe. Like, say, a friend
is being dumb with a gun
you can say, ‘Hey, you’re
not being safe, cut that out’
and tell them what they are
doing wrong and correct
that.”
According to Whitney at
the Nationals in Nebraska
there were over 600 shoot-
ers with guns.
She said, “Yet you felt
great. Everyone was super
friendly. I never saw one
instance of anyone mishan-
dling anything. They keep
everything open until they
stepped up to shoot and it
was all very safe.
“You just felt perfectly
safe and confident that
these kids are always safe.
They carry around the
guns and they are always
open—it was like any
other sport carrying their
equipment, like a bag of
golf clubs, perfectly safe.
“The guns are broken
open. They never load
until they are right on the
line to shoot. Even if the
guns were broken open,
if someone were to swing
it around they’d be done.
Safety is that important to
them.
“Safety is drilled into
them so now even at home
when Sam cleans his gun if
he walks from one point to
another, his firearm is br -
ken open. Programs like
this need to grow. It takes
a lot of fear away from the
parents, too.
“If people haven’t been
around guns, they can be
afraid if them because of
all the media hype and un-
familiarity. When you see
your kids being responsible
and completely in control
of a sporting tool, it takes
all the mystery out of it.”
Sam added, “A lot of
people don’t see that side
of it. They just see the
criminals shooting people
and decide all guns are
bad. But it’s a fun sport
that is completely con-
trolled and safe.”
4H also has specific
rules about what to call
the firearms. Calling guns
weapons is not allowed.
“That implies you are
going to hurt someone
with them, so we aren’t
allowed to use that term in
referring to our firearms,”
Whitney added. “I think
that if every kid did a
program like this in school,
there would be hardly any
accidental shootings. I
mean an accident is an ac-
cident, so there are always
going to be some, but I’m
talking about the ones we
call accidental that could
have been prevented with
some education—like by
kids picking up guns and
not knowing anything
about them like how they
work, proper cleaning stuff
like that. Those accidents
would go away.”
Although Sam did not
qualify at State to go to
Nationals next year, he
says it’s okay because
“even if I would have, I
couldn’t go. Once you’ve
gone to Nationals in an
event you can never go in
that event again. It’s a one-
time thing.”
One, however, may be
eligible in another event.
“It does give others an
opportunity so it’s not the
same kids going every
year,” he said.
But Whitney said,
“Now that we have seen a
national competition, I’m
like, if we could go another
year we could get this
down. It is good, though,
because you’re going to
get all different kinds of
kids. We saw the level of
competition with our own
eyes. Some standouts were
Texas, Missouri and Min-
nesota.”
Leonard John Radinovich, 18, from John Day, died in
a single vehicle crash on highway 26 near milepost (MP)
152 in Grant County.
On Sunday, August 16, 2015, at approximately 5:12
a.m., a silver, Toyota 4-Runner, was traveling eastbound
on highway 26 near MP 152 when Radinovich lost con-
trol of the vehicle. The vehicle veered off the highway,
rolled, and came to rest in a near-by field.
Radinovich was not restrained by a seatbelt and was
ejected from the vehicle. He was pronounced deceased
at the scene of the crash. The passenger, a 15 year old
juvenile, was properly restrained and not injured.
Alcohol is being investigated as the contributing factor
of the crash. Trooper Weaver is the lead investigator.
OSP was assisted at the scene by Grant County Sher-
iff’s Office, John Day Police Department, and the Oregon
Department of Transportation.
Community
Bank pays $12K
for good grades
Submitted Photos.
Top: Logan Perkins. Bottom: Kaidan Dalke. Both of
Baker City.
The fifth year of Community Bank s Earn While You
Learn Program has set an all-time high in pay-outs to
student-customers for their academic success. For the
2015 pay out period, 576 students in the Eastern Oregon
and Southeast Washington area cashed in on their good
grades. Community Bank paid them a total of $12,581!
Since the bank’s program began in 2011 the amount
of payouts has steadily increased. In the first year of the
Bank’s Earn While You Learn Program just four years
ago, 190 students were paid $3895. A total of $6975
was paid to over 275 student-customers in 2012. A big
increase occurred the following year with $11,173 paid
out in 2013; $11,939 to 531 students in 2014. This brings
the program’s grand total of academic award money to
$46,563.
In Baker City, 23 students participated, earning a total
of $445.
The program was designed to encourage students
in their academic success by awarding them for good
grades. During the months of June and July, all Com-
munity Bank branches accepted end-of-the-year report
cards from students in grades 1st through 12th. For every
top grade in a main school subject (A-, A, A+ for middle
and high school, and S+, E, etc. for grade school) that ap-
peared on the report card, Community Bank deposited $1
into their Community Bank Youth Savings Account.
The Earn While You Learn Program is an annual re-
ward of $1 per top grade, up to $50 annually per student,
with payments given for the whole school year in June
and July.